I’m not a fan of having a Less Wrong forum. One of LW’s advantages is that it has low volume and high quality. It doesn’t take much of my time to read and most of the posts are worth reading. Forums are the opposite: higher volume and lower quality. This makes forums a bigger time sink for everyone: moderators, posters, and readers.
I think the low volume high quality nature of the LW front page is why a forum would be a bonus. People could hash out more low to mid quality ideas without detracting from the more developed postings that the readers who want to invest less time are looking for. I’m not a fan of a forum in lieu of the current LW format, but as an idea incubator, I think it could be interesting and of use.
I think a forum here would be fantastic. I don’t believe it would detract from the articles, it would just give discussions that have potentially smaller interest bases a chance to still develop.
I definitely agree that a forum would allow for more discussion, particularly of the less-momentous but still-beneficial topics. In particular, I think that discussions of actual strategies people have tried, what has worked and not worked, could actually be highly beneficial. I see them as data we need to collect in order to begin forming some kind of method for actually helping rationalists win in real world situations.
Even a general forum would be great—I wouldn’t mind finding out what books and movies the rest of LW enjoys; this place is what turned me onto Torchwood. Though I could understand worries that it might distract from the core purpose of this site.
AIUI, the forum idea was tried for Overcomingbias.com back when it was a shared-authorship blog. It didn’t quite work out.
There’s plenty of opportunity to hash out lower-interest points here. In addition to the monthly open threads, just clicking on “Recent posts” in the sidebar will bring up a list of posts which didn’t make the front page.
Some life hacking: narrow the distance between “I wish” and “I will”. Shared hosting starts in the realm of $5/month. Open source forum software is very available. With fairly basic computer skills and Google you’re probably not more than 6hrs away from having the forum you want. Some early research might narrow that gap further.
Forum is people first and foremost. I see no way I could attract LWers to a forum on a separate site. Besides, that is not what I want at all. I want a forum here.
This is an Open Thread. No restrictions here. Though, I wish we’d replace these with a proper forum that’s active throughout the month.
I’m not a fan of having a Less Wrong forum. One of LW’s advantages is that it has low volume and high quality. It doesn’t take much of my time to read and most of the posts are worth reading. Forums are the opposite: higher volume and lower quality. This makes forums a bigger time sink for everyone: moderators, posters, and readers.
I think the low volume high quality nature of the LW front page is why a forum would be a bonus. People could hash out more low to mid quality ideas without detracting from the more developed postings that the readers who want to invest less time are looking for. I’m not a fan of a forum in lieu of the current LW format, but as an idea incubator, I think it could be interesting and of use.
If the open thread were always visible somewhere in the sidebar, would that constitute “a proper forum” for you? or if there were weekly open threads?
I think a forum here would be fantastic. I don’t believe it would detract from the articles, it would just give discussions that have potentially smaller interest bases a chance to still develop.
I definitely agree that a forum would allow for more discussion, particularly of the less-momentous but still-beneficial topics. In particular, I think that discussions of actual strategies people have tried, what has worked and not worked, could actually be highly beneficial. I see them as data we need to collect in order to begin forming some kind of method for actually helping rationalists win in real world situations.
Even a general forum would be great—I wouldn’t mind finding out what books and movies the rest of LW enjoys; this place is what turned me onto Torchwood. Though I could understand worries that it might distract from the core purpose of this site.
AIUI, the forum idea was tried for Overcomingbias.com back when it was a shared-authorship blog. It didn’t quite work out.
There’s plenty of opportunity to hash out lower-interest points here. In addition to the monthly open threads, just clicking on “Recent posts” in the sidebar will bring up a list of posts which didn’t make the front page.
What are you referring to?
Some life hacking: narrow the distance between “I wish” and “I will”. Shared hosting starts in the realm of $5/month. Open source forum software is very available. With fairly basic computer skills and Google you’re probably not more than 6hrs away from having the forum you want. Some early research might narrow that gap further.
Forum is people first and foremost. I see no way I could attract LWers to a forum on a separate site. Besides, that is not what I want at all. I want a forum here.